December 18, 2013

Getting Crafty - Handmade Wreath and Mini Mid Century House

Here's a wreath I made this season in some of my down time. It took about an hour to do in total, so if you're thinking about attempting something similar, do it! In no time at all, you'll have a very adorable new holiday decoration!

I started by mapping out pieces of cardboard to construct the walls and roof of my little home. Then I carefully glued it all together piece by piece with my fancy new glue gun. (Somehow my old one disappeared!)

Also if you're wondering, I left the inside of the house hollow, so it would be lightweight and could later be glued easily onto my wreath.

I wanted my house to look super crafty and casual. Sort of an imperfect, slightly wonky look you often find on vintage mini Putz-style houses. To achieve this look, for all my fabric and paper pieces I didn't do any measuring. I glued the main wall coloured paper on with my hot glue gun and the rest of the smaller pieces with regular craft glue.

Here's the other side, which I did in a completely different colour pattern! It's a 2-in-1! I liked the idea of turning the wreath around to get a new style if you were bored of the one side, or maybe it wouldn't always go with your other holiday decor. A little change can be good.

Can you spot the little tree I cut out of shiny metallic green wrapping paper? There's one on each side for some extra detail.

The roof was so much fun to make. I used a mixture of white glitter and some vintage heavier-weight glitter, which is actually more like tiny, clear plastic chips. My Grandma gave it to me from her years of painting and glazing ceramics. She used this one for her christmas village scenes, to look like snow, so I thought this was fitting. I first covered the roof with blank white paper and then drew scallops on the top with my glue gun. While still warm I dipped it in a bowl of my glitter concoction. To create the appearance of icicles, I let the glue drip off the side of the roof a little, and dipped the sides in glitter as well.

To finish off the look I hid the unfinished edges of the house with embroidery thread.

Now all that was left was to glue it onto my wreath I made a few days prior.

All I did was cut a thin square out of cardboard, staple one end of tinsel garland to it and

start wrapping away! Once I got to the end I stapled the other end. Super easy.

Side one...

and side two!

I packed this one up recently and shipped it out to my Giveaway Winner as part of her prize. For some reason I always end up giving things away more than I keep things for myself. I was planning to make more of these, but it looks like I have run out of time. The next couple of weeks are already scheduled full, so I doubt I'll be making any more mini houses this year. Next year I'll make time to create a whole village!